I am kind of homesick right now.

A lot of my friends went back home for their spring breaks and I stayed back in Seattle. That did not really bother me though. I have had a lovely break thus far and have kept pretty busy despite there not being many people around.

I do not even miss southern California per se; I just miss people. I miss that familiarity of friends back home.

I will be missing my dad’s 75th birthday this year. I usually make him a lemon poppyseed birthday cake. Missing both of these things depresses me.

I have one brother. His name is Christopher and he is twenty three years older than I.

He is my half-brother from my dad’s side, but I never use the “half” when talking about him.

Good lord, where to start. Chris is honestly the best older brother I could ask for. He took me everywhere when I was little. We always went out for ice cream at Penguins and ate Raisin Nut Bran on the couch out of chip bowls.

We did a lot of driving together in his old, burgundy Acura. He and I frequented Dodger Stadium. I still may not love baseball (or the majority of other sports) like he does, but I have a lot of good memories there. When I was in kindergarten, he moved out to his own apartment in Santa Monica. He still visited on a regular basis. He would pick me up and take me to the beach.

A lot of my memories with him involve driving. During those drives, I discovered music. I remember he had one of those huge CD cases and whenever there was a stop in the 5’s ridiculous traffic, he would turn to the back seat and pick out a CD. At the time, I didn’t care because all the music I knew was from my Disney movies and whatever my mom sang while she washed the dishes. Then he put Third Eye Blind into the CD player and track three was on. It was that intro that sold it to me. Well, the intro and the fun knee slapping game Chris made to go along with it. Did I know the song was about doing lines of coke and having sex? No, of course not. I just liked the “do do do, dodododooo, do do do” in the beginning. I made him play that album every time we went out together.

But then I grew up. I was the weird, overweight kid throughout the majority of my childhood. I was very much into art. I played soccer. I played volleyball. Then I got back into music. I started high school. I started figuring out what I wanted to do in life.

And you know what? He was always there for all of it. If he knew I was interested in something, he would find events for me to go to because he knew my parents wouldn’t. When I thought I was going to be an animator, he cut out articles about the industry and famous animators from the LA Times and mailed them to me. He came to all my soccer games. He drove all the way to Downey to go see my first starting game of freshman volleyball—we won that day too, which made it all the more exciting. When I got into and rejected from schools, he said “Fuck Berkeley and go where feels right.” He fought with my parents about letting me move up to Seattle for school.

Chris has always been there for me. He has always pushed me to try new things and always do my best. He reminds me to always fight for what I believe in and to be a passionate person. He has been one of, if not, the most supportive figures in my life. I love my big brother.